At my church, Prince of Peace Lutheran in Brookfield, we do not have "first communion" the way that many other churches have first communion.

We do not have a period of instruction that leads up to a day when a group of children finally receive their first communion.

Instead, at our church, any Sunday could be a first communion for some child, or even an adult, in our congregation.

For some, the day of their baptism is also the day of their first communion. For others, it happens around the time they start reaching for the bread and the cup.

For still others, it happens after a period of more formal instruction.

One child, around a year old, had his first communion the day when he watched me distribute the host to his mother and then calmly took it out of her hand and ate it.

Just as calmly I said to him, "The body of Christ, given for you. Welcome to the Lord's table." I then proceeded to commune his slightly surprised mother again.

Many of the children in our congregation will never remember a time when they were not communing members of the church.

For those new to our congregation or outside our congregation -- even some other Lutherans -- this seems like a strange way to conduct things, with infants and toddlers taking communion, and first communions happening any Sunday.

There is concern that the children will not take communion seriously enough or will not understand what is happening when they take communion.

There is concern that a sacrament of the church will be reduced to snack time.

I truly understand and share that concern. The sacrament of the altar needs to be honored. Its integrity as a holy mystery needs to be maintained.

But when we allow children, with their capacity for belief and wonder, to participate in the sacrament, I believe that the sacrament is honored and that its mystery and holiness is faithfully tended by the youngest among us.

One Sunday, during a children's sermon, I asked the gathered children, "Have you ever seen Jesus?"

I do not remember what answer I was expecting, but I remember getting one I did not foresee.

A 5-year-old who had had no formal instruction in the meaning of communion pointed to the altar and said, "We see Jesus when we take communion."

We take many opportunities to teach children about communion at Prince of Peace. One of them is a communion event held every other year, during which children bake the communion bread for use at a worship service, participate in skits that tell Bible stories about communion, learn about the meaning of communion from one of the pastors, and tour the sacristy and the altar with one of our altar guild members.

Most of the children who participate in the communion event have been receiving communion for many years. Some, though, will receive their first communion the day after the communion event and will also present the communion bread that they made with their classmates at the altar for use at communion.

More important than the exact date, age or way in which they receive their first communion are all of the communions that come after it -- all of the times when they gather at the Lord's table with their church community.

When they commune, they participate in a meal that transcends time and space -- it is a meal during which we Lutherans believe Christ is present and we are joined with the faithful all over the world and with the great cloud of witnesses who have gone before us into God's heavenly kingdom.

From its Latin roots, the word "communion" means "a sharing" or "with unity." With that meaning, it is ironic that communion is something about which various Christian denominations are known to be divided.

Different churches teach different things about what communion means, different churches have different rules about who is allowed to receive communion and at what age, and different churches distribute communion in different ways.

But in that moment we receive communion -- in whatever way our church practices, whether it is our first communion or our 700th -- I believe we receive it as little children, fed by a loving hand.